Bursa to suspend China company CSL, fails to meet extended deadline

PETALING JAYA: Trading in the shares of China Stationery Ltd (CSL) will be suspended by Bursa Malaysia from July 9 after the company failed to meet the extended deadline to submit its audited annual financial statement for the financial year ended Dec 31, 2013 (FY13).

Bursa had rejected the company’s request for a new deadline of July 31.

It had already been granted a two-month extension to June 30 by the exchange to submit its accounts.

Meanwhile, CSL has until July 31 to release its results for the first quarter ended March 31, which was due on May 31.

The company will face a harsher penalty, including possible delisting, if it fails to issue the outstanding financial statements within six months from the expiry of the relevant time frames.

CSL has blamed its accounting woes on a fire incident at one of its plants in China’s Fujian Province.

The incident destroyed approximately 10,000 sq m of the 15,422sq m production plant in Fujian Province on April 4.

Its auditor, Messrs RT LLP, said it was unable to proceed with “walk-in bank confirmations” and sight of fixed assets, as well as complete the audit fieldwork on CSL’s subsidiaries in China.

CSL is an integrated plastic stationery company with its own brands of plastic stationery, proprietary products and technical knowhow.

Its products are divided into two main categories; patented and non-patented.

CSL designs and manufactures an assortment of more than 450 plastic filing and storage products such as expendable files, pocket files, compact-disc holder files and businesscard holders. It sells its products under its own brands such as Sakura, Nachi and Foldersys.

Of late, there has been an array of China-based companies listed on Bursa including China Ouhua Winery Holdings Ltd and HB Global Ltd which have been facing accounting problems.

The external auditors of China Ouhua Winery have expressed a qualified opinion on the company’s accounts for FY13, while HB Global failed to submit its annual audited accounts for FY13.

CSL has been on a free fall, closing at 8.5 sen yesterday from 19 sen on April 25.